Highways hit roadblocks in 2012

Difficulties in land acquisition and delays in environmental clearances added to the problems.

Even intervention of the Prime Minister's office could not lead to tangible results.

The issue of banks' unwillingness to finance projects is pending at the level of Prime Minister's Office, which asked the Ministry to address the matter to the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council so that it can be resolved.

A number of private companies in the road sector during the year had raised the issue of a conservative and rigid approach by banks in providing loans to the highways projects with the Transport Ministry.

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Image: A woman works at a road construction site.Photographs: Jayanta Dey/Reuters

Highways hit roadblocks in 2012

"The Requests for Qualification are in place and shortly we are going to award these projects," he said, stressing, "Already the global environment has impacted Indian economy, lenders have been instructed to be cautious of their investments in this country."

Last year there was aggressive bidding and the Ministry got Rs 3,000 crore (Rs 30 billion) premium on the projects bid out," Joshi said, expressing hope that these projects would come up next year despite bankers being cautious in lending to the sector.

"Times are changing hopefully we will get good response in 2013. Last (financial) year, the infrastructure sector witnessed Rs 80,000 crore (Rs 800 billion) worth of investment in infrastructure.

Highways hit roadblocks in 2012

On the issue of not being able to achieve the target of building 20 km of roads a day, Joshi said, "Once you award the projects the construction takes three years, the difference between award and construction is normally three years.

"In 2011-12 we could award more than 7,000 km, we got Rs 3,000 crore worth of premium, the trend was there in 2011-12 but the scenario changed in 2012-13.

"We hope in the coming months once again we will get good response."

The Ministry faced much criticism on the front with even a parliamentary panel in its latest report saying that building 20 km of highways per day has been a distant dream so far."

Highways hit roadblocks in 2012

Meanwhile leading infrastructure firms are trying to find buyers for their road projects, as per the industry.

The National Highways Authority of India also was in media focus during the year for wrong reasons like inordinate delays in projects like Golden Quadrilateral.

"NHAI is not in a position to complete any project and is adding projects after projects without achieving targets in older ones," the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport has said in its latest report, adding, "This shows their deficiency either in planning of programmes or proper execution of the same."